


The Last Page

by ThreadWing



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Based on a Tumblr Post, Coma, False Memories, Gen, Hospital
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-21
Updated: 2013-08-21
Packaged: 2017-12-24 06:28:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/936495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThreadWing/pseuds/ThreadWing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The strangest thing about waking up was not remembering falling asleep.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Last Page

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by a_cumberbatch_of_cookies tumblr post. See the bottom of the page for it's contents
> 
> This is an un-beta'd fic, so feel free to point out any errors or suggestions

The strangest thing about waking up was not remembering falling asleep.

He remembered Moriarty sticking a gun down his own throat, and he remembered carefully toeing the roof’s edge as a light wind whistled around him. He’d had a plan for this, he’d always had a plan, but he had to be careful. He could just barely hear the commotion of cars and city traffic below him as white hot blood roared in his ears, tunneling his vision.

He needed to calm down, he wasn't going to die.

He remembered seeing the cab, the one he’d been waiting for, and he remembered pulling his phone out of his pocket. He could see every line on John’s face as realization hit him, as though his eyes had focused in on him like a hawk.

He remembered saying goodbye, tossing the phone aside, spreading his arms wide, and feeling like a crow with a broken wing as he fell, coattails whipping quietly behind him. Everything was so quiet.

He remembered hitting the ground, a quick snap, and then the dull throb of pain replacing his heartbeat. He remembered watching John struggling to reach him as blood flooded his eyes, blotting out his image.

That was all. He didn't remember falling asleep.

So why was he waking up?

He struggled to focus his vision as the unbearably white room bled through the receding darkness.

His eyelids were so heavy.

His fingers flexed instinctively against the crisp white sheets. It took him a moment to realize that someone was holding his wrist.

His head felt like it was moving through oil as he focused on the rough fingers, following the lightly tanned arms up to a warm, familiar face.

“John.” His throat was dry and his voice cracked severely as though from extreme disuse.

John smiled brightly, a quiet, breathy laugh escaping his lips as he squeezed lightly at his hand. Sherlock slowly moved his fingers to entwine through the shorter man’s, for once craving the security they brought.

“Where am I?” Hospital, he thought immediately after the question left him. Obvious from the smell of antiseptic and the slow metallic thrum of a heart monitor. Why had he asked?

“Hospital.” John replied, still smiling. He was dressed in a nurses pale blue scrubs. “But don’t worry, you’ll be fine. I’m glad you know my name.” His eyes seemed to sparkle in the hard light.

It took a minute for Sherlock to fully swallow that sentence, though he didn't understand it. “What?”

“You called me John.”

“Of course I did, that’s your name.” Something akin to doubt crossed Sherlock’s mind, making him furrow his brow “Isn't it?” 

“Yes, it is.” John replied.

Sherlock was still confused.

John scratched absently at the back of his ear, looking him over. “Maybe I should explain. Sherlock, you've been in a coma.”

Sherlock said nothing, trying to piece things together. The plan should have worked, he shouldn't have been this badly injured.

“For two years now.” John continued, carefully watching his expression. “You attempted suicide, I’m told, barely made it out with your life. If officials had been a minute later...” John trailed off, searching Sherlock’s face for some kind of reaction.

Sherlock stared at him. That... that couldn't be right. John didn't look a day older than when he’d last seen him, running towards his slowly dying... And why did he have to be told? He was there, wasn't he?

Two years... That’s about how long he’d known John for. He strained to think back to two years ago, rifling through his memories that seemed to be scattered on the floor all around him. Where was his mind palace? Two years ago he’d met John at St. Bartholomew’s, moved in with him two days later. John had saved him from the cabbie, their first case...

“How did I attempt suicide?” His voice was slow and quiet, not wanting to believe a word of this nonsense.

John had to think back “Um, pills I think, an overdose or a poison. It was a strange affair, if I recall.”

“How so?”

“Well, there were four others, just like you, none of them showed suicidal tendencies, all of them took the same pill, all of them self administered. The police were calling it serial murders, but serial suicides...”

“It was murder.” Sherlock interrupted him. “All of them. The cabbie, they all rode with the same cabbie, _we_ all did. He took them, us to secluded places, made us take the pills, he... he.....” What was this? He was never this inarticulate, where were his thoughts? Where was his mind palace? It was in ruins.

John looked at him, confused, shuffling through his own memories. “Um... The murders stopped after the attempt on your life, and there was a man, a London cabbie admitted to the morgue a few days later, if I remember correctly. Died of an aneurysm in his flat. Do you remember the cabbie’s name?”

Sherlock furrowed his brows. “Spring, Sun, one syllable, something bright...”

“Hope?”

“Yes, Hope.”

“Yeah, that was the name on his ID, Jefferson Hope. Well, I guess that case is closed, eh?” John tried to lighten the mood with a smile.

Sherlock was silent.

John cleared his throat, looking down at a chart on the bedside table. “You’ll be leaving soon, I guess. There’s no reason you shouldn't be able to function in everyday life again, although I would suggest consulting a therapist... It’s going to be so different when you’re gone.”

“How so?” Sherlock asked

“Well,” John shrugged, picking at the cover of a book Sherlock had just noticed he was holding in his lap. Why hadn't he noticed that earlier? “I would come in here, everyday, while you were under. On my lunch break, just to visit.”

“Why?”

John didn't take his eyes off the books cover “I don’t know... because I knew no one else would, I guess.” He looked up at him, smiling, and held up the book “I read detective stories to you.”

Why had no one come to visit him? Surely Mrs. Hudson, Molly, even Mycroft... “You read me detective stories?”

“Yeah, they’re my favourite, so I figured you might like them too. Why?”

“I... could hear you.” Sherlock whispered, suddenly overwhelmed by the crushing feeling of his whole reality crumbling around him. Sherlock was in a coma and John had read his life to him. He wasn't a detective, didn't help the police solve serial murders. Everything that took place over the past two years, he had dreamed it all. Because he could hear John reading him detective stories. That’s why his mind palace was in ruins, it never existed. He probably wasn't even clever. He was _normal_.

“You could?” John asked. Sherlock’s mind had been so far off so fast that he had to take a moment to think back to his previous statement.

“Well, not consciously, I suppose. No, I was never conscious. But I was... was there a man? Jim Moriarty?”

John had to think about that question for a moment before he realized Sherlock was talking about the stories. “Um... oh, yeah, Moriarty was the main villain. A consulting criminal, he called himself.”

Sherlock nodded. “And a Woman?”

“The Woman, yes. Irene Adler.”

Sherlock didn't want to ask, but he had to know. “Mrs. Hudson?”

John smiled. “They were all characters, Sherlock.”

Sherlock sat up straight, closing his eyes against the spinning room. His mouth still frantically spilled names. “Lestrade? Molly? Donovan? Anderson?”

John dropped the book on the table, standing up quickly to gently ease the taller man back down into the bed. His hands were warm. “They weren't real. They were just stories.”

Sherlock relaxed back onto the thin hospital pillows, focusing on John’s strong grip to root himself in this reality. He took a deep breath, trying to force himself to think.

But he couldn't.

No mind palace. Just a jumble of memories, real and fake, indistinguishable from one another.

“Mycroft...” He said at last, adding one more name to the list.

“Who?”

A small spark of hope lit in his chest, and he opened his eyes again to stare intently at John. “He wasn't a character?”

John shook his head no. “I don’t know that name.”

He was real! Sherlock wanted something, anything back from the life he thought he’d led, even if it was his irritating, bothersome, annoying, glutinous big brother.

The start of a smile twitched at his lips, when a sudden realization dawned on him. “He hasn't come for me?”

John frowned “Not that I know of.”

Sherlock rifled through his memories, trying to put them in some sort of order. Digging, fishing, hunting for the one he was looking for and, having finally found it, deeply wished he hadn't.

John leaned forward as a look of pain crossed the man’s face. “Who’s Mycroft? Sherlock?”

John’s voice startled him. “My brother. He’s my older brother...”

“Do you know why he hasn't come to see you?”

“He’s dead.”

John tilted his head in an expression of pity, which Sherlock didn't see. “I’m sorry.”

Sherlock raised his hand, waving off his concern “It’s fine, he died five years ago.” Car accident. His brother’s life was ended because some imbecile decided he could make the light. A faint smile crossed his lips, as though he’d remembered a fond memory. It didn't reach his eyes. “I always hated him. But after he was gone... Well, that’s when I started...”

“Drugs?” John asked. He was so quiet, Sherlock almost forgot he was there.

“Yeah.”

John bowed his head, examining his hands. “You were heavily addicted when you were admitted. Had to keep you under observation through detox. Some of the doctor’s wanted to let you go, since no one claimed you. But the police wouldn't let them, said you were a witness. Even after the case was closed, I wouldn't have it...”

Sherlock nodded in understanding. “No one claimed me?”

“No... Do you have any family?”

His mind palace was reduced to dust. What was the point of looking? “I guess not.”

John frowned. “It looks like you’re experiencing some mild amnesia.”

Sherlock shook his head lightly “It’ll clear up.”

“Even still.” John said, standing up again “You should rest. My break’s almost over, so call me if you need anything.” He walked around the foot of the bed, stepping towards the door.

A moment of pure panic overcame Sherlock. If John were to walk through that door, he was sure he would never come back. He had no home, false memories, Mrs. Hudson was gone, as was Lestrade, and Molly. He wasn't a consulting detective, wasn't anything. He was a former drug addict that had just woken up from a coma. No job, the only life he knew was a story, and the last page was about to walk out on him. “John, wait!” he all but screamed, reaching out for the man.

John turned around quickly, afraid something was wrong. “What? What is it?” He offered his arm for Sherlock to hold, which he grasped with scrabbling fingers.

“Don’t leave.”

“Why?”

“You’re all I have left.”

**Author's Note:**

> a_cumberbatch_of_cookies post: _A Sherlock AU were it turns out Sherlock has made up his whole life with John as a consulting detective while stuck in a coma caused by an overdose. The real John is just a kind doctor at the hospital that sits by Sherlock’s bed and reads him detective stories._
> 
> Also this was half inspired by my experience coming out from under general anesthesia. Weirdest feeling in the world


End file.
